The Bowl of Kumquats

There it sits, on the counter by the sink,
a bowl of kumquats,
each an owl’s eye,
staring into me with equal measures
judgment and innocence.
I didn’t steal anything!
I say to no one for no reason,
and the kumquats sit in their bowl
with inanimate silence,
nuns huddled in their convent.
Talk to me, I say, absolve—
they begin to swell
like water balloons except no one’s at
the spigot.
They’re shattering the bowl,
shards everywhere cut my feet,
still they swell with orange menace.
My eyes begin to turn orange
and now it’s forcing, shrinking me.
Stop! Stop—
The bowl of kumquats
twitches its unseemly eye
and they sit their glum—
a bowl of kumquats with one more.

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